Jim Tresner, Grand Cross

With the film National Treasure and Dan Brown’s books The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons, Freemasonry has appeared a lot in popular culture lately. Some of our younger Brethren may not realize that Freemasonry has often appeared in books, movies, and stories enjoyed by the general population. So this column is devoted to some of the best.

Rudyard Kipling, The Man Who Would Be King: And Other Stories. This classic, first published in 1888, is available in several different editions, both hardbound and paperback. Dover has a good paperback edition for only $2.00 (www.doverpublications.com).

The setting for Kipling’s story is India in the time of England’s global empire. Our “heroes” are two members of an Army Lodge who were once in the British army. They run afoul of a local cult (which they have been exploiting) and are about to be killed when an old priest sees and recognizes a Square and Compasses jewel about the neck of one of them. Things get complicated from there. The story was made into a great movie, directed by John Huston, and starring Sean Connery, Michael Caine, and Christopher Plummer. It’s beautifully filmed and acted, as you would expect from that director and cast, and is available on DVD from Amazon.com for $16.99.

While you are in the bookstore or on the Internet, pick up a copy of Kim, considered by many to be Kipling’s best work. It is another story in which Freemasonry plays an important role.

H. G. Wells, “The Story of the Inexperienced Ghost.” There are several collections of short stories by Wells available, and your bookseller will be happy to help you find one. It will take only about three minutes to read this story, but it is not without Masonic interest. In the story, the Lodge of the Four Kings, which “devotes itself so ably to the study and elucidation of all the mysteries of Masonry past and present,” is probably the English Research Lodge, Quatuor Coronati.

W. Michael Gear, The Artifact, New York: Daw Books, Inc., Paperback, 1990, 526 pages. This book is worth the effort of doing some Internet shopping. Amazon.com had used copies for as little as one cent. New, it was $6.99.

Word comes back to Earth of a discovery on a distant planet, an artifact left by a long-vanished race. There is reason to believe it can give terrific powers to the person who can operate the artifact, so it is necessary to find someone of absolute integrity to bring it back. The person is Captain Solomon, who commands the starship Boaz and is a member of the “Brotherhood.” And when he takes command of the ship, there is this exchange: “Boaz is yours if you have the Word and the Signs. / I have the word. / How do you have it?/ I’ll letter and halve it with you. / Letter it and begin. / Begin you. / The Word is yours, you must begin.” It’s a good story with some interesting plot twists and a warm, glowing vision of the future of the Fraternity.

Umberto Eco, Foucault’s Pendulum, trans. William Weaver. First published in 1989 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, available in both hardbound and paperback. The list price for the hardbound edition is $31.00, but an Internet search is worthwhile. I bought it new, hardbound, on the Internet for $20.00 and could have bought a used hardback in good condition for $15. New paperback editions are available from $7.98 with used paperbound editions from about $3.00.

This is a book incredibly rich in imagery and symbolism, but you can also read it as a whopping adventure yarn. We have St. John’s Day, the Templars, the structure of the Kabbalah, the Freemasons, the Rosicrucians, and, of course, St. Germain. It all starts when three friends, weary of unending conspiracy theories, decide to have fun by linking everything they can find about conspiracy theory, no matter how wild, in a computer, just to see if they can evolve a plot as a creative exercise. The result will amaze you.

Katherine Kurtz & Deborah Turner Harris, The Adept. This first book of series may be out of print, but copies of it and the other books in the series can be found on the Internet with an average price of less than $7.00.

Speaking of compelling adventure yarns, The Adept series is one of the best. The books are set in Scotland, and our hero is Dr. Adam Sinclair. He is a skilled psychiatrist, but he is also the Master of a band of men and women who fight evil at the esoteric level. His best friend and colleague is an officer of the police who is also a very active Mason. Masonry weaves in and out of these stories as a most powerful thread. Hard to put down, the series includes The Adept, The Lodge of the Lynx, The Templar Treasure, Dagger Magic, and Death of an Adept. The last four are in print and easy to find on the Internet or in book stores. BUT PLEASE HEED THIS WARNING: the books form one continuous story. Be sure to start with the first one and read them in order. Otherwise, you are bound to be confused.

Robert A. Heinlein, Revolt in 2100 and Methuselah’s Children. Baen Books, this edition, 1999, paperback, ISBN 0671577808, $6.99, but check the Internet. Revolt in 2100 has been through numerous printings, and there is a wide variety of both new and used copies available.

Of all the books with Masonic references, Revolt in 2100 is my great favorite. America has become a theocracy in which individualism and freedom are strongly suppressed. Our hero joins a secret group, the Cabal, which is fighting for freedom. See if this sounds familiar: “I heard a strong bass voice intoning a prayer: ‘Vouchsafe thine aid, Almighty Father of the Universe...love, relief and truth; to the honor of Thy Holy Name. Amen.’ The answering chorus ‘So mote it be!’ Then I was conducted around the room, still hoodwinked, while questions were again put to me. They were symbolic in nature and were answered for me by my guide.” In the present printing of the book, it is paired with another great Heinlein classic, Methuselah’s Children, so this book is a double treat.

Jim Tresner, Valley of Guthrie, Okla., is the Director of the Masonic Leadership Institute; Editor of The Oklahoma Mason, Member of the Steering Committee, Masonic Information Center; Director of Work in Guthrie; and author, among other books, of Albert Pike: The Man Beyond the Monument and Vested in Glory: The Regalia of the Scottish Rite. Contacts: Grand Lodge of Oklahoma, P.O. Box 1019, Guthrie OK 73044; Tel. 405-282-3212; Fax 405-282-3244; okmasonmag@hotmail.com